


Allegory of the Cave

by Rehlia



Category: Undertale (Video Game)
Genre: Gen, Oneshot, Papyrus just wants everyone to be happy, Philosophy, can be read as sad or as uplifting
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-01-23
Updated: 2017-01-23
Packaged: 2018-09-19 12:48:33
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,818
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/9441053
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Rehlia/pseuds/Rehlia
Summary: Papyrus doesn’t believe in the surface.





	

It’s a cold day even for Snowdin. The snow is crisp and pristine under his boots, a smooth blanket of pure white that’s still unmarred by the footprints of other monsters. It sits on the trees and bushes of the forest like thick frosting on a cake, looking soft and gentle and as if, were someone to wrap it around him, it would keep him warm like a thick blanket. Icicles hang from some of the branches on the trees and the hoarfrost paints the bark and needles of the firs white, giving the entire forest the appearance of something ethereal and fleeting, like the snow globe he saw in a shop in New Home once. 

Papyrus makes his way through the forest carefully and quietly. 

He places his feet deliberately so he doesn’t slip, also taking care to disrupt the beauty of the snow as little as possible. He evades low-hanging branches, icicles, and places where he knows the ground to be uneven under the snow. He doesn’t speak. 

The town of Snowdin is already far, far behind him. He has made his way deep into the woods, down the cliffs that the town is perched on and a long distance from any paths or the outposts of the Royal Guard. 

He only stops once he reaches a small clearing that was once shown to him by his friend Flowey, an elongated oval of free space, with only a rock disrupting the otherwise flat ground there. This is where he sits down. The rock is one thing Papyrus has always loved about this clearing: it’s exactly the right height for him to sit on, not too low and not too tall, so his long legs bend just right, and the surface of the rock is smooth and there’s a small dip on its top, so he can rest his bones comfortably against it instead of having a harsh, flat surface irritate his bulbous joints and sensitive tailbone. He had thanked Flowey loudly for being so thoughtful; the flower is a true friend. 

Today, he isn’t meeting with Flowey though. 

Papyrus came here to be alone, and think. 

Generally speaking, he prefers the company of other monsters over being all by himself. He likes to talk to someone and hear their thoughts, hear how they admire him and his accomplishments, and pay them genuine compliments in return. Even his brother with his frequent puns and the unfortunate laziness - he might nag him, but only because he wants what’s best for Sans! Clearly, being more productive and having a better sense of humour is what’s best for his brother. He’ll just have to make him see it, that’s all. But he loves his brother, flaws and all, deeply and honestly, and he enjoys his company. 

Sometimes though, Papyrus steals away. 

Not because he suddenly doesn’t enjoy the company anymore, not at all! It’s just… nice, sometimes, to be by himself and think for a bit. About certain things. 

About… 

About the sky. 

The sun. 

The surface. 

Papyrus doesn’t believe in the surface. 

He doesn’t really believe in any of those things and he doesn’t understand how so many monsters can. They are so steadfast and firm when they talk about it! Completely and utterly convinced that all Asgore has to do is take seven human souls and then, miraculously, the barrier will shatter, the very edge of their world will vanish, and there will be a new world behind it, different from this one. 

It just sounds so… silly, if he’s being perfectly honest. What more world could there be? At some point the world just ends, and that’s that, because nothing can go on forever. And the end of the world happens to be the barrier, a magical wall that nothing can pierce. Everything else is just make-believe, isn’t it? 

The other monsters keep saying there’s more out there, a wide open sky and a sun and weather. 

Which just really shows that it’s all made up, in his opinion. 

They already _have_ a sky. It’s right up there, Papyrus thinks, leaning back on his favourite sitting rock, craning his head back to look up. There it is: white, misty clouds swirling around some of the low hanging stalactites. Currently, it’s bright because it’s day. Later, it will get dark, when it’s night. Other places in the Underground are different, of course. It’s always night in Waterfall, where only the glowing plants and stars - the rocks in the ceiling - give light. In Hotland, it never really gets dark as the magma continues to burn underneath it all. And in New Home, they have a similar set-up as the monsters here in Snowdin do, light at day and dark at night. 

Some monsters say the crags in New Home are where one can see the _real_ sky. 

Papyrus has seen it, but he honestly can’t tell the difference. 

So there’s a couple of crags in the ceiling and beyond that, there’s some blue and white and something bright, or alternatively something dark with sparkles on it. Doesn’t seem very different to the sky here in Snowdin or the one in Waterfall, to be honest. 

Some monsters also say that the stars in that _real_ sky are more beautiful than the ones in Waterfall. His brother is one of those monsters. Sans keeps saying he wants to actually see them one day, once they’re free, instead of trying to catch glimpses through those crags. Apparently the crags make it difficult to stargaze. Papyrus thinks that’s a little bit silly, too. If Sans wants to stargaze, obviously the best point to do it is Waterfall, that’s where the view is best. 

But those are, apparently, not _real_ stars, because _real_ stars are not rocks. 

Papyrus loves his brother, he truly does, but when Sans tried to explain about how he believed that _real_ stars are giant balls of fire that just kind of fly out in the open, but very far away, further than anyone could ever imagine, and that those fireballs are bigger than the entire Underground thrice over, and that the sun is also such a fireball - 

Well, he would never want to discourage his brother, of course. 

Sans is so seldom enthusiastic about things, Papyrus wouldn’t want to extinguish that spark. So he had nodded and said ‘I UNDERSTAND, SANS, THANK YOU FOR EXPLAINING,’ and then occasionally encouraged his brother to pursue his interest in those _real_ stars, because it made his brother happy and more energetic and Papyrus feels that it’s healthy for Sans to have a hobby that makes him happy and more energetic. 

But privately, he had sighed and wondered how his educated, intelligent brother could believe in such nonsense. 

It’s nice in theory of course. The idea that somewhere out there, in a world not their own, there’s something better. Something grander. Something more exciting, brighter and more beautiful. A place where all their dreams would come true, no matter what. A place that was more real than the often boring reality they lived in. Papyrus can see how monsters find comfort in such ideas, how it might give them something to strive for, how it might feed their hopes and dreams and inject a little bit of colour when the mundane tedium of everyday life starts to feel too grey. 

He has these kinds of dreams too of course; not goals like wanting to get into the Royal Guard but actual dreams, ones he knows are fantasy, like driving one of those fantastical machines called cars along a highway. 

And that in itself isn’t a problem, Papyrus thinks, that in itself is fine. 

The problem is more… the problem is more that he watches the monsters, and his brother, and they talk about the surface as the ultimate goal, the end goal to all of their efforts. They will reach it, and they will take it back from the ‘humans’ and then they will all live happily ever after. 

That’s what the problem is. 

Because then what? 

Then they’d all be in a beautiful new world and they’d explore it and they’d live in it and somewhere along the line, inevitably, just because that’s a side effect of living somewhere for a while, they’d become used to it. 

It would still be beautiful and grand and great, but it would be normal. 

The monsters have not learned to appreciate what they have. And so Papyrus fears that, once the paradise they all dreamed about inevitably becomes mundane, they would do the only thing they know how to do, and look _up_.

And they would see, according to the believers, a wide blue sky with a sun and some other stuff in it, and they would start dreaming about what’s beyond _that_ … 

Something better. Something grander. Something more exciting, brighter and more beautiful. A place where all their dreams would come true, no matter what. A place that was more real than the often boring reality they lived in.

They would never be happy. 

Papyrus believes in dreaming, believes in curiosity and exploration and asking questions. Those are all very good things! He just thinks that it’s not a good idea to hinge the entirety of one’s happiness on the idea of some intangible better place beyond reality. Because even if such a place exists - if someone somehow actually shatters the barrier and leads them out, proves that the surface is real, he will happily accept that as fact, he’s not so blinded by his own ideas that he wouldn’t, it’s just that it’s been about a thousand years and that just doesn’t bode well, does it - there’s no sense in putting off being happy, in saving all the happiness for later, for that fabled place, foregoing being happy in the here and now. As if the happiness they have here in the Underground is somehow not good enough, not _real_ enough to count. How sad is that? 

Very sad, if someone were to ask him. 

But of course nobody does. 

Papyrus sighs, and stretches his legs out in front of him, relishing in the comfort of his favourite sitting rock, thoughtfully picked out and shown to him by a friend he cares about, relishing in the beauty of a snow-covered, frozen forest, relishing in the quiet that allows his thoughts to wander freely, relishing in the knowledge that soon, he will get up and walk back and meet his brother and eat delicious food and joke around in a town full of kind monsters where they have a big and cozy house filled with things that make him happy. Well, except for the sock in the living room, but still. 

Papyrus is happy. 

Most importantly, he knows how to be happy regardless of how real he thinks the world is. 

He hopes that his brother at least will one day learn that, too.


End file.
